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AN ADDRESS 




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DELIVERED AT 


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The Evening of Nov. 28, 1886, 




J, H, KELLOGG, JVI. D, 


Editor of Good Health,” Author of the Home Hand-Book of Rational 
Medicine and Domestic Hygiene,” and numerous works on 
Health, and Superintendent of the Medical 
& Surgical Sanitarium, at Battle 
Creek, Mich. 


Published by Request. 


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HEALTH PUBLISHING CO., 

BATTLE CREEK, MICH. 

1887. 


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GANITARIUM PRESS. 
















































Social Purity 


.iLOST .iLIDIDIRIESS 


DELIVERED 


AT BATTLE CREEK, MICH., 

THE EVENING OF NOV, 28, 1886, 


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J. H: KELLOGG, M. D. 




Published Ly Request of the Audience. 



HEALTH PUBLISHING COMPANY. 
BATTLE CREEK, MICH. 

1S86. 





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Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1886, 



By J. H. KELLOGG, M. I>., 

In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 



ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. 


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* 










PRI^S'AOi:. 


3 - ■ {> 

ttHHE subject considered in the following pages is one of 
'f|F most stupendous importance, and one which is rapidly 
gaining the recognition of Christian men and women every¬ 
where, and of all those who esteem purity of morals irre¬ 
spective of religious belief. The magnitude, extent, and real 
character of the evils of social and personal impurity, are 
no more than hinted at, the chief aim of the speaker hav¬ 
ing been to call attention to the causes from which these 
evils grow. That the most startling disclosures might be 
made, all who are at all acquainted with the subject are 
well aware. The speaker has for years occupied a position 
which has afforded him an exceptional opportunity for ob¬ 
servation of the extent and results of these evils, and the 
facts which have come to his personal knowledge entitle 
him to speak with even greater emphasis than in the ad¬ 
dress herewith presented. He deemed it wiser, however, to 
speak moderately and temperately. The general sentiment 
regarding public utterances upon this question must be ed¬ 
ucated, and a vast amount of unintelligent and prudish prej¬ 
udice must be broken down before the whole truth can be 
spoken upon this subject. 

The address was delivered by request before an audience 
of more than one thousand people, fully two thirds of whom 
signed the purity pledge. At the close of the lecture the 
audience passed a unanimous vote requesting that the ad- 

(W) 




IV 


Preface. 


dress should be published, and individual orders were im¬ 
mediately given for more than ten thousand copies. 

It is the earnest hope of the author of this address that 
this feeble portrayal of the greatest evil of the age, may¬ 
be the means of enlightening some who are in ignorance, of 
warning a few who might otherwise rush headlong to de¬ 
struction, and of helping those who are engaged in the 
noble work of elevating and saving their fellow-men, to 
accomplish their philanthropic purposes. That this little 
work may find a useful mission, is the earnest prayer of 
both author and publishers. 


* * * 


^ S0GIA1 3J^tiRlTV.j< 



Y FRIENDS : I have been asked to address 
you to-night upon the subject of Social Purity. 

1 This subject is one which has been much 
talked about, and written about in a general 
way; but public prejudice and perverted modesty 
have until recently prevented specific public utter¬ 
ances concerning those causes which lie at the root of the 
evils, the existence of which is well enough known to 
us, no matter how sedulously we may have endeavored 
to hide our eyes from them, or how persistently we may 
have closed our ears to the long wail of anguish and of 
unutterable woe which ever comes up from the abyss of 
moral corruption in our midst, which no amount of sen¬ 
timental morality and prudishness can hide. I offer no 
apology for what I have to say, as I understand that 
those who compose this audience have come here fully 
apprised of the nature of the subject to be discussed 
on this occasion. 

We boast of our Christian civilization. We talk 
with pride of our foreign missionaries and the conver¬ 
sion of the heathen. We imagine that the glorious mil¬ 
lennium is just beginning to dawn, while all the time a 
malignant ulcer is eating at the vitals of our society. 

If one ventures 
(5) 


We vainly seek to hide the ugly sore. 





6 


Social Purity. 


to talk to us about it, we say, Hush ! such topics are 
indelicate; these things are not to be recognized in 
good society. But the foul cancer of moral rottenness 
will protrude itself in all its hideous deformity, in spite 
of our frantic efforts at concealment. And it does not 
confine itself to the brothel and the gutter; this monster 
of iniquity—unchastity—rears its vile head in every 
stratum of society, and among the fairest results of 
modern culture. A few months ago the Christian w r orld 
was more than startled by the horrible revelations of 
the Pall Mall Gazette , of London, which gave something 
of an idea of the ghastly exhibition of vice which stands 
at the very center of modern culture and civilization, and 
according to the reports referred to, is even fostered by 
princes and royal personages. 

Nor is this terrible state of things confined to the 
Old World. So good an authority as Dr. Elizabeth 
Blackwell tells us that we would “ uncap perdition if we 
should expose the vices of our great American cities.” 
Every grade of society is being permeated and cor¬ 
rupted by the most horrible and ineradicable diseases, 
maladies which have their origin in 'social impurity. 
And there are evils still more hidden which are doing 
their work of physical and moral destruction. Personal 
impurity is sapping the vital energies, debasing the 
mental faculties, and blunting the conscience of thou¬ 
sands of youth, who are ignorant of the present and 
eternal ruin which they invite. Unwarned and unre¬ 
pentant, thousands are going down into the grave a 
sacrifice to hidden vices. If I could unfold to you one- 
tenth part of the iniquity which is covered by a garb of 
decent respectability in every community, it would 
seem to you that the days of Sodom and Gomorrah had 


Effects of Bad Diet. 7 

returned; that ancient Pompeii and Herculaneum had 
been resurrected from the lava and ashes of retributive 
Vesuvius; that perdition itself had vomited upon the 
earth. 

But it is not my purpose to portray the moral cor¬ 
ruption of the age. The inquiry which is of greatest 
importance to us is, What are the causes which have led 
to this condition of affairs ? This is not a fitting occasion 
for a discussion of all the causes with which the observ¬ 
ing and experienced physician is familiar; but I shall 
undertake to point out a few of those influences which I 
believe to be active agents in leading the young to lives 
of impurity. And in w T hat I have to say upon this sub¬ 
ject I shall not hesitate to call things by their right 
names. The time for silence, for timidity, for false 
modesty, for prudishness, has long passed, and those 
w T ho are awake to the awful importance of this subject 
are in duty bound to speak out, and to speak in no un¬ 
certain tones, to “cry aloud u$on the house top,” at 
least to declare without circumlocution and without equiv¬ 
ocation, the truth, and the whole truth, on every suitable 
occasion. 

The Effects of Bad Diet—Bad diet plays a not in¬ 
significant part in the early and abnormal development 
of the animal instincts. When old enough to take food 
in the ordinary way, the infant’s tender organs of di¬ 
gestion are plied with highly seasoned viands, stimulat¬ 
ing sauces, sweetmeats, and dainty tidbits in endless 
variety. Soon tea and coffee are added to the list. 
Pepper, ginger, mustard, condiments of every sort, de¬ 
teriorate his daily food. Overeating, eating between 
meals, hasty eating, eating indigestible articles of food, 
ices, late suppers, and various other dietetic errors, all 


Social Purity. 


contribute to the establismerit of morbid conditions which 
encourage impurity. 

When children are thus badly fed, what wonder that 
they occasionally “ turn out bad ” ! How many mothers, 
while teaching their children the principles of virtue in 
the nursery, unwittingly stimulate their propensities at 
the dinner table until vice becomes almost a physical 
necessity ! These exciting causes continue their insid¬ 
ious work through youth and more mature years. Right 
under the eyes of fathers and mothers they work the 
ruin of their children. Nothing tends so powerfully to 
keep the animal impulses in abeyance as a simple, un- 
stimulating dietary. The boy whose blood is made hot 
and feverish with stimulating food, whose nerves are ir¬ 
ritated and excited by mustard, pepper-sauce, and other 
exciting condiments, is poorly prepared to resist the 
temptations which are certain to come to him when he 
mingles with other boys on the street, at school, or 
wherever he may come’in contact with them. A man 
rushing through a burning building, among blazing fagots, 
with sparks flying in every direction, with tongues of 
flame darting at him from every side, would be con¬ 
sidered very reckless if he should venture to carry with 
him upon his arm an open bucket filled with gunpowder, 
or if he should smear his clothing with pitch, oil, or 
other inflammable material; but such a man would be 
in no greater danger than the lad whose blood is in¬ 
flamed with heating, stimulating food when he goes out 
to mingle with the world, and meets on every hand the 
tempting allurements which are certain to assail him. 

Evil Associations.—The influence of evil companion¬ 
ship is one of the most powerful agents for evil against 
which those who love purity, and are seeking to elevate 


Evil Associations, 


9 


and benefit their fellow-men, have to contend. One bad 
boy may do more harm in a community than can be 
counteracted by clergymen, Sabbath-school teachers, 
tract-distributers, and other Christian workers combined. 
An evil boy is a pest compared with which the cholera, 
small-pox, and even the plague, are nothing. The dam¬ 
age which would be done by a terrific hurricane sweeping 
with destructive force through a thickly settled district, 
is insignificant compared with the evil work which may 
be accomplished by one vicious lad. 

No community is free from these vipers. Every 
school, no matter how select it may be, contains a greater 
or less number of these young moral lepers. Often they 
pursue their work unsuspected by the good and pure, 
who do not dream of the vileness pent up in the 
young brains which have not yet learned the multiplica¬ 
tion table and scarcely learned to read. I have known 
instances in which a boy seven or eight years of age has 
implanted the venom of vice in the hearts and minds of 
half a score of pure-minded lads within a few days of his 
first association with them. Vice spreads like wild-fire. 
It is more “ catching ” than the most contagious disease, 
and more tenacious, when once implanted, than the 
leprosy. 

Boys are easily influenced, either for right or wrong, 
but especially for the wrong; hence it is the duty of 
parents to select good companions for their children, and 
it is the duty of children to avoid bad company as they 
would avoid carrion or the most loathsome object. A 
boy with a match box in a powder magazine would be 
in no greater danger than in the company of many 
of the lads who attend • our public schools and play 
upon the streets. It is astonishing how early children, 


10 


Social Purity. 


especially boys, will sometimes learn the hideous, shame¬ 
less tricks of vice which yearly lead thousands down to 
everlasting death. 

Mothers cannot be too careful of the associations of 
their children. Often those who would be least sus¬ 
pected of such wickedness, are the agents of sin, and 
will instruct their innocent little ones in the most de¬ 
basing habits. Trust no one not known to be pure. 
Keep your little ones under your own roof until you are 
sure that their characters are sufficiently well-formed to 
resist the encroachments of evil. Build up bulwarks 
against vice by developing the pure and the good in 
their characters and repressing evil tendencies. The 
first impure thought instilled into a child’s mind is usu¬ 
ally the source of all the subsequent ruin. A prurient 
curiosity is excited, which craves satisfaction, and will 
not rest until the desired information is obtained. Thus 
the evil seed germinates and develops, and in due time, 
under ordinary circumstances, brings forth an abundant 
crop of impure ideas, which fill the mind and result in 
impure acts. A child whose mind has been contam¬ 
inated by evil communications may be rescued, but can¬ 
not be fully restored to the innocence which when once, 
lost, is gone forever. A scar will always remain which 
cannot be effaced. Hence it is vastly better to prevent 
evil communications than to undo their effects after the 
work of mischief has been done. 

Influence of Bad Books— Bad books play not a 
small part in the corruption of youth. A bad book is 
as bad as an evil companion. In some respects it is 
even worse than a living teacher of vice, since it may 
cling to an individual at all times. It will follow him, 
and poison his mind with the venom of evil. The in- 


Influence of Bad Books. 


ll 


fluence of bad books in making bad boys and men is lit¬ 
tle appreciated. Few are aware bow much evil seed is 
being sown among the young everywhere through the 
medium of vile books. It is not only the wretched vol¬ 
umes of obscenity, of which so many thousands have 
been seized and destroyed by Mr. Comstock, that are 
included under the head of bad books, and which corrupt 
the morals of the young, but the evil literature which is 
sold in “ dime and nickel novels,” and which constitutes 
the principal part of the contents of such papers as the 
Police Gazette , the Police News , and a large proportion of 
the sensational story books which flood the land. You 
might better place a coal of fire or a live viper in your 
bosom, than to allow yourself to read such a book. The 
thoughts that are implanted in the mind in youth will 
often stick there through life, in spite of all efforts to 
dislodge them. It is an awful thing to allow the mind 
to be thus contaminated; and many a man would give 
the world, if he possessed it, to be free from the horri¬ 
ble incubus of a defiled imagination. 

Many of the papers and magazines sold at our news¬ 
stands, and eagerly sought after by young men and 
boys, are better suited for the parlors of a house of ill- 
repute than for the eyes of pure-minded youth. A 
news-dealer who will distribute such vile sheets, ought 
to be dealt with as an educator in vice and crime, an 
agent of evil, and a recruiting officer for hell and per¬ 
dition. 

There is another class of books not usually called ob¬ 
scene, which are, if anything, even more pernicious in 
their influence than those of a grosser character. I re¬ 
fer to books written by men and women whose sole ob 
ject is gain, and who do not hesitate to introduce in one 


12 


Social Purity. 


way or another ideas which tend in exactly the same di¬ 
rection as the class of books which are pronounced illegal, 
and are suppressed, wherever found, by authorized agents 
of the Government. Often these prurient, sensual ideas 
are presented in the most refined and elegant language, 
and interwoven with other thoughts which may be in 
themselves elevating. 

It is not always the direct object of these writers to cor¬ 
rupt the morals of their readers. They recognize the fact, 
however, that a very large class of readers have an intense 
relish for works which give here and there hints of dark 
intrigues, illicit amours, and other manifestations of sen¬ 
suality, and introduce this class of ideas as a sort of 
spice by whicli to render their productions palatable 
to the depraved taste of a large proportion of the novel¬ 
reading public of the present day. 

Within a generation, a special class of literature has 
sprung up, known by the general term of “ Sunday-school 
books.” The supposed characteristics of these books are 
wholesome thought, freedom from immoral tendencies, 
and the inculcation of pure and elevating principles. 
Unfortunately, many books even of this class are, from 
our standpoint, wholly unsuitable to be read by young 
girls and boys, if, indeed, they are suitable to be read by 
anybody. The fact that a book is a “ Sunday-school ” 
book should not be sufficient recommendation to a mother 
who desires to preserve the simple-hearted purity of her 
children. Every mother should scrutinize with the 
greatest care the reading matter supplied to her daugh¬ 
ter at Sunday-school or day-school, from the town li¬ 
brary, circulating libraries, or libraries of friends. From 
whatever source a book or paper or magazine comes, it 
should be carefully examined before being placed in 


Influence of Bad Books. 13 

the hands of a child old enough to read and comprehend 
its meaning. I once took from the hands of a little girl 
a book over which she had been poring for hours, and 
found on the open page sentiments which made my 
cheeks tingle with shame that authors could be so lost 
to the interests of purity and virtue, and so reckless of 
results, as to pen such sentiments as were expressed so 
plainly that even a young and unsophisticated school-girl 
could not fail to comprehend the import of the language. 

Sentimental literature, whether impure in its subject 
matter or not, has a direct tendency in the direction of 
impurity. The stimulation of the emotional nature, the 
instilling of sentimental ideas into the minds of the 
young, has a tendency to turn the thoughts into a chan¬ 
nel which leads in the direction of the formation of 
vicious habits. 

The reading of works of fiction is one of the most per¬ 
nicious habits to which a young person can become de¬ 
voted. When the habit is once thoroughly fixed, it 
becomes as inveterate as the use of liquor or opium. 
The novel-devotee is as much a slave as the opium-eater 
or the inebriate. The reading of fictitious literature de¬ 
stroys the taste for sober, wholesome reading, and im¬ 
parts an unhealthy stimulus to the mind, the effect of 
which is in the highest degree damaging. 

When we add to this the fact that a large share of 
the popular novels of the day contain more or less mat¬ 
ter of a directly depraving character, presented in such 
gilded form and specious guise that the work of contam¬ 
ination may be completed before suspicion is aroused, it 
should become apparent to every careful mother that her 
sons and daughters should be vigilantly guarded against 
this dangerous source of injury and possible ruin. 


14 


Social Purity. 


I have met many cases of serious nervous disease 
in young ladies in which the real cause was nothing 
more nor less than habitual novel reading. The un¬ 
healthy state of mind engendered, reacted upon the body 
in such a way as to set up morbid processes, resulting in 
serious disease. 

I do not insist that nothing should ever be read but 
history, biography, or perfectly authentic accounts of 
experiences in real life. There are undoubtedly novels, 
such as “ Uncle Tom’s Cabin” and a few others which I 
might mention, which have been active agents in the ac¬ 
complishment of great and good results. Such novels 
are not likely to do anybody any harm; but the number 
of harmless works of fiction is very limited indeed. 
Many works which are considered among the standards 
of literature are wholly unfit for the perusal of young 
ladies who wish to retain their simplicity of mind and 
purity of thought. I have felt my cheeks burn more 
than once when I have seen young school-girls intently 
poring over the vulgar poems of Chaucer or the amorous 
ditties of Burns or Byron. Still worse than any of these 
are the low witticisms of Rabelais and Boccaccio; and 
yet these volumes are often found in libraries readily 
accessible to the young. The growing influence of this 
kind of literature is far more extensive than can be 
readily demonstrated. 

Many writers for children and youth seem to think 
a tale of “ courtship, love, and matrimony” entirely 
indispensable as a medium for conveying their moral 
instruction. 

Some of the so-called u religious novels ” are actually 
more pernicious than the fictions of well-known novelists 
who make no pretense to having religious instruction a 


Influence of Bad Books. 15 

particular object in view. Sunday-school libraries are 
not often wholly composed of this class of works; but 
any one who takes the trouble to examine the books of 
such a library, will be able to select the most pernicious 
ones by their external appearance. The covers will be 
well worn, and the edges begrimed with dirt from 
much handling. Children soon tire of the shallow same¬ 
ness which characterizes the “ moral ” parts of most of 
these books, and skim lightly over them, selecting and 
devouring with eagerness those portions which relate 
the silly narratrce of some love adventure. This kind 
of literature arouses in children premature fancies and 
queries, and fosters a sentimentalism which too often 
occasions most unhappy results. Through their influ¬ 
ence, young girls are often led to begin a life of shame 
long before their parents are aware that a thought of 
evil has ever entered their minds. 

It is an omen of good that this subtle and much- 
ignored influence for evil is being recognized, and warn¬ 
ings uttered against it by prominent clergymen whose 
eyes have been opened to its mischievous work. Per¬ 
mit me to reinforce what I have said upon this point by 
the forcible utterance of one of the most talented preach¬ 
ers of the day, Rev. T. De Witt Talmage : “ You may 
tear your coat or break a vase, and repair it again; but 
the point where the rip or the fracture took place will 
always be evident. . It takes less than an hour to do 
your heart a damage which no time can entirely repair. 
Look carefully over your child’s library; see what book 
it is that he reads after he has gone to bed. Do not 
always take it for granted that a book is good because 
it is a Sunday-school book. As far as possible, know 
who wrote it, who illustrated it, who published it, who 
sold it. 


16 


Social Purity. 


“ It seems that in the literature of the day, the ten 
plagues of Egypt have returned, and the frogs and lice 
have hopped and skipped over our parlor tables. 

“ Parents are delighted to have their children read, 
but they should be sure as to what they read. You do 
not have to walk a day or two in an infected district to 
get the cholera or typhoid fever; and one wave of moral 
unhealth will fever and blast the soul forever. Perhaps, 
knowing not what you did, you read a bad book. Do 
you not remember it altogether? — Yes; and perhaps 
you will never get over it. However strong and exalted 
your character, never read a bad book. By the time 
you get through the first chapter, you will see the drift. 
If you find the marks of the hoofs of the Devil in the 
picture, or in the style, or in the plot, away with it. 

“ But there is more danger, I think, from many of the 
family papers, published once a week, in those stories of 
vice and shame, full of infamous suggestions, going as 
far as they can without exposing themselves to the 
clutch of the law. I name none of them; but say that 
on some fashionable tables there lie ‘ family newspapers’ 
that are the very vomit of the pit.” 

Impurity in Art.—Under the guise of art, the gen¬ 
ius of some of our finest artists is turned £o pandering 
to a base desire for sensuous gratification. The pictures 
that hang in many of our art galleries, which are visited 
by old and young of both sexes, often number in the 
list views which to those whose thoughts are not well 
trained to rigid purity, can be only means of evil. A 
plea may be made for these paintings in the name of 
art; but we see no necessity for the development of art 
in this particular direction, when nature presents so 
many and such varied scenes of loveliness in landscapes, 


Unchaste Language. 


IT 


flowers, beautiful birds, and graceful animals, to say 
nothing of the human form protected by sufficient cover¬ 
ing to satisfy the demands of modesty. 

Unchaste Language. —The use of impure language 
by old and young is an evil which is of the very great¬ 
est moment. It is too often ignored; too little is said 
about it; far too often it is regarded as of little conse¬ 
quence ; and persons who are really not bad at heart, 
thoughtlessly encourage the evil by listening to and 
laughing at obscene and ribald jokes, and impure lan¬ 
guage which ought to make a pure man blush with 
shame to hear. 

“ Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth 
speaketh. . . . Every idle word that men shall speak, 
they shall give account thereof in the day of Judgment. . 
. . By thy words thou shalt be condemned.” Matt. 12 : 
34, 36, 37. In these three brief sentences, Christ pre¬ 
sents the whole moral aspect of this subject. To any 
one who will ponder well his weighty words, no further 
remark is necessary. Let filthy talkers but consider 
for a moment what a multitude of “ idle,” unclean words 
are waiting for account in the final day; and then let 
them consider what a load of condemnation must roll 
upon their guilty souls when strict justice is meted out 
to every one before the bar of Omnipotence, and in the 
face of all the world — of all the universe. 

The almost universal habit among boys and young men 
of relating filthy stories, indulging in foul jokes, making 
indecent allusions, and subjecting passers-by to lewd crit¬ 
icism, is a most abominable sin. Such habits crush out 
pure thoughts; they annihilate respect for virtue; they 
make the mind a quagmire of obscenity; they lead to 
overt acts of lewdness. 2 


18 


Social Purity. 


But boys and youth are not alone in this. More often 
than otherwise, they gain from older ones the phraseology 
of vice. And if the sin is loathsome in such youthful 
transgressors, what detestable enormity must character¬ 
ize it in the old! And women, too, are not without 
their share in this accursed thing, this ghost of vice, 
which haunts the sewing-circle and the parlor as well as 
the street corner and the bar-room. They do not, of 
course, often descend to those depths of vulgarity to 
which the coarser sex will go, but couch in finer terms 
the same impure thoughts, and hide in loose insinuations 
what words could not well express. Some women* who 
think themselves rare paragons of virtue, can find no 
greater pleasure than in the discussion of the latest scan¬ 
dal, speculations about the chastity of Mrs. A or Mr. B, 
and gossip about the “ fall ” of this man’s daughter or 
the adventures of that woman’s son. Those who can 
gloat over others’ lapses from virtue, and find delight in 
such questionable entertainments as the discussion of 
the most recent scandal, have need to purify their 
hearts. 

Impure Thoughts.—No one can succeed long in keep¬ 
ing himself from vicious acts whose thoughts dwell, with¬ 
out restraint, upon unchaste subjects. Only those who 
are pure in heart will be pure and chaste in action. The 
mind must be educated to love and to dwell upon pure 
subjects in early life, as by this means only can the foun¬ 
dation be laid for that purity of character which alone will 
insure purity of life. When the mind once becomes 
contaminated with evil thoughts, it requires the work 
of years of earnest effort to purge it from uncleanness. 
Vile thoughts leave scars which even time will not always 
efface. They soil and deprave the soul, as vile acts do 


Impure Thoughts. 


19 


the body. God knows them, if no human being does, 
and if harbored and cherished, they will tell against the 
character in the day of Judgment as surely as will evil 
words and deeds. 

The seventh commandment, with the Saviour’s com¬ 
mentary upon it, places clearly before us the fact that 
chastity requires purity of thought as well as of outward 
acts. Impure thoughts and unchaste acts are alike vio¬ 
lations of the commandment. Unchastity of the mind 
is also a violation of natural law' as well as of moral law, 
and is visited with physical punishment as well. 

It is vain for a man to suppose himself pure who al¬ 
lows his imagination to run riot amid scenes of impure 
associations. The man whose lips delight in tales of 
vileness, whose eyes feast upon obscene pictures, who is 
ever ready to pervert the meaning of a harmless word 
or act into uncleanness,—such a one is not a virtuous 
man. 

Man may not see these mental wanderings, he may 
not perceive these filthy imaginings; but One sees and 
notes them. They leave their hideous scars upon the 
soul. They soil and mar the mind; and as the record 
of each day of life is photographed upon the books of 
heaven, they each appear in bold relief, in all their in¬ 
nate hideousness. 

Foul thoughts, once allowed to enter the mind, stick 
like the leprosy. They corrode, contaminate, and infect 
like the pestilence; naught but Almighty power can de¬ 
liver from the bondage of sin a soul once infected by 
this foul blight, this moral contagion. Young man, you 
who have abandoned yourself to mental uncleanness, 
weigh carefully this thought: Would you like to have 
your mother look in upon your mind? Would you 


20 


Social Purity. 


respect your father if you knew his mind to be such a 
quagmire of mental filth as your own ? Can you respect 
yourself when you reflect upon the gro§sness of your 
own thoughts, the vile imaginings to which you have 
given loose rein ? 

Know well, young man, your sin will find you out. 
You may profess to be a man above reproach. Perhaps 
you are a church member, and an active worker in Chris¬ 
tian enterprises of various sorts; but this will not save 
you from becoming stamped with the marks of sensu¬ 
ality. Your mental vileness is not hidden, even from 
human eyes. An unclean mind reveals its true charac¬ 
ter in that wonderfully accurate mirror, the human face. 
Every thought, every changing mental state, finds silent 
but emphatic expression in the face. When rage, hate, 
envy, agitate the brain, the muscles of the face mold it 
so as to fit the mental state, and these awful passions 
stand out in bold relief. Sorrow and grief, joy and hap¬ 
piness, produce an equally striking picture. So also 
with this vice. A mind filled with vile thoughts, makes 
a corresponding picture upon the face. With photo¬ 
graphic accuracy the muscles of expression portray the 
mental abominations within. By and by the transient 
expressions of the face become fixed, when the mind is 
allowed to dwell upon unclean things, and the face is in¬ 
delibly stamped with the insignia of vice. As we mingle 
with young men and boys, as we pass them on the street, 
how many such faces do we see ! How many faces por¬ 
tray a character stained by sin, soiled by moral filth! 
A mind accustomed to think of sin comes to look upon 
it as desirable, and loses all appreciation of its hideous¬ 
ness and its consequences. The change from innocence 
to guilt, from purity to vice, is not a sudden transition. 


Impure Thoughts. 


21 

The work of ruin is not accomplished by one fatal 
plunge, but by little departures, small harborings of sin¬ 
ful thoughts, until the mind becomes defenseless against 
the encroachments of sin. 

Purity of life depends upon purity of mind; and the 
only way to secure the first is by the cultivation of the 
second. 

Incessant mental occupation is the only safeguard 
against sin. Those worthless fops who spend their lives 
in “ killing time ” by lounging about bar-rooms, loafing- 
on street corners, or strutting up and down the boule¬ 
vard , are anything but chaste. Those equally worthless 
young women who waste their lives on sofas or in easy- 
chairs, occupied only with some silly novel, or idling 
away life’s precious hours in reverie, — such creatures 
are seldom the models of purity one would wish to think 
them. If born with a natural propensity toward sin, 
such a life would soon engender a diseased, impure im¬ 
agination, if nothing worse. 

Young man, have you become a slave to a sensual 
mind ? Are you one of those mental adulterers who 
loiter about the streets, gazing with wicked eyes upon 
virtuous passers-by ? who visit the theater, the lecture 
hall, even the house of God, for the purpose of discover¬ 
ing new victims for their vile fancy? or who go up and 
down in all the walks of society, seeking whom they 
may devour? Do you belong to this horrible class of 
satyrs, monsters in human shape, moral assassins, cow¬ 
ardly, sneaking, conscienceless invaders of virtue ? Let 
me say to you, that certain retribution awaits you. 
“As a man thinketh, so is he.” The mental filth in 
which you revel will utterly emasculate your character 
of all its god-like attributes. You shall find yourself 


22 


Social Purity. 


accursed in this world and the next. The pure joys of 
true love, of domestic peace and bliss, you shall never 
taste ; and at the great day, when all men are called 
upon to render an account of their deeds, when every 
hidden thought stands out in boldest characters before 
the Judge of all the world, then shall your mean and 
filthy soul be weighed, and you will be sent away with 
those of whom it shall be said, “ I never knew you.” 
If you have taken the first step down toward this condi¬ 
tion of mental infamy, call a halt at once in your mind- 
wanderings. Cease your vicious imaginings ; and by 
constant watchfulness and prayer, endeavor to win back 
your unchaste mind to paths of purity and virtue. Cry 
earnestly to God as did one of old, “ Create in me a clean 
heart, 0 God, and renew a right spirit within me.” 
“ Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, 
and I shall be whiter than snow.” 

The Tendency of Fashionable Life. —Fashionable 
life, with its frivolities and dissipations, is a foe to virtue. 
The whole tendency of modern fashionable life is in the 
highest degree calculated to stimulate the development of 
the emotional nature, which leads directly to the exag¬ 
geration of the propensities. The cultivation of the 
u esthetic ” at the expense of the practical, and the de¬ 
votion to the thousand and one nothings which make up 
the sum total of a fashionable woman’s life, are by no 
means conducive to the growth of purity and the re¬ 
pression of the animal instincts. With an untrained 
mind, that is, one which has not cultivated self-control 
and the habit of making a careful analysis of the feelings, 
one emotion is often converted into another seemingly 
wholly unlike and incompatible with the first. The cul¬ 
tivation of the emotional nature at the expense of the 


Degenerate Manners. 


23 


reasoning faculties is on this account a most serious 
error. Theater-going, novel-reading, dancing, attendance 
at fashionable parties, flirtation, and a variety of other 
practices exceedingly common in the life of the average 
young lady, are the means by which the moral sense 
becomes depraved and the character so unbalanced as 
to break down the barriers to impurity, and to open 
the way for the encroachments of the tempter. 

Degenerate Manners.—The prevalent looseness of 
manner in the associations of the sexes is one of the 
most prolific of all the predisposing as well as exciting 
causes of vice. Womanly modesty is a quality which 
is becoming, in many social circles, quite too rare. The 
manners of the times are such as to abolish the reserve 
and modesty so characteristic of maidenhood in olden 
times. A bashful girl is much more difficult to find 
now-a-days than was the case a quarter of a century 
ago. Children, girls especially, are too early accustomed 
to publicity, and are led to believe that bashfulness is a 
sin next to falsehood or theft. A certain forwardness 
of manner is becoming exceedingly prevalent among 
young girls as well as boys. By many, this trait is con¬ 
sidered an evidence of smartness, and is encouraged; to 
my mind, it is a most alarming indication of deteriora¬ 
tion in women of those qualities upon the preservation 
of which depends the maintenance of virtue and purity. 

This matter is one which should receive the earnest 
attention of mothers, teachers, and all who have to do 
with the education of girls. The old-fashioned modesty 
and innocent simplicity of manner must be presented as 
the pattern to be followed instead of the bold and flip¬ 
pant style of bearing so exceedingly common among the 
girls of the present day. A retiring and reserved man- 


24 


Social Purity. 


ner is one of the very best safe-guards to virtue, and 
woman cannot afford to dispense with so important an 
aid to purity in the nineteenth century, any better than 
in generations past and gone. 

Mothers should check in their daughters the very 
first manifestations of a tendency to boldness of manner, 
and should carefully shield them from the influences of 
those who exhibit this unfortunate trait. 

Excessive familiarity of the young of both sexes in 
social intercourse, tends in a most decided manner to 
break down the barriers against impurity, and to prepare 
the way for the most flagrant violations of purity and 
chastity. The unrestrained liberty which parents allow 
their sons and daughters who have not yet attained 
years of maturity and discretion, the opportunities af¬ 
forded by theaters, balls, fashionable parties, etc., and 
the other vice-favoring conditions of modern fashionable 
society, operate as efficiently in the corruption of morals 
as though the organizers of modern society had purposely 
A arranged for the accomplishment of that very destruction 
of virtue and morality which we see so evidently taking 
place all around us at the present day. 

Evils in Courtship.—The unlimited freedom allowed 
the young during real or pretended courtship is certainly 
not conducive to improvement in the direction of social 
morality. The fashion prevalent in some communities 
by which young people who are contemplating marriage 
may sit up until the small hours of the morning, with 
curtains closely drawn and lights turned low or extin¬ 
guished, is in no particular less inconsistent with purity 
of morals than the practice of “ bundling ” which once 
prevailed among the early Dutch settlers of New York, 
and is still not unknown in some of the remote rural 


Evils of Courtship. 


25 


districts of Pennsylvania. A mother who allows such a 
practice under her roof, must be considered accessory to 
the consequences. Fathers and mothers who wish to pre¬ 
serve the purity of their sons and daughters, should make a 
vigorous protest against the growing looseness of man¬ 
ners and unrestrained freedom of social intercourse 
among the sexes, whether carried on under the guise of 
courtship, or without the cover of this flimsy excuse. 

There was a time in the history of the world when 
a young man who had committed a gross crime against 
virtue, was considered unfit to live, and was taken with¬ 
out the city, and pelted to death with stones. At the 
present time, a young man who is known to be a rake, 
is made welcome to the most aristocratic circles of soci¬ 
ety, and often receives as much or even greater atten¬ 
tion from fashionable young women, and older women 
too, than those whose lives are spotless. 

Another evil to which attention should be called is the 
almost universal practice of promiscuous kissing of chil¬ 
dren. Mothers allow their little daughters to be fondled 
and caressed by men whose characters are wholly un¬ 
known to them. Often entire strangers are allowed to 
treat the little ones with as much freedom as a father or 
a brother. The boldness of manner thus cultivated 
must tend most strongly to the destruction of modesty 
and the breaking down of the barriers against impurity, 
which in this degenerate age should be in every way 
protected rather than weakened. Nothing has been 
said of the actual danger to health, and even life, in¬ 
volved in such reckless exposures, but it may be suffi¬ 
cient to say that numerous cases are on record in which 
the most loathsome and impure of diseases have been 
contracted in this very manner. Promiscuous kissing of 


26 


Social Purity. 


her little ones, whether boys or girls, is a thing which 
no intelligent and well-informed mother will for a mo¬ 
ment allow. 

A False Standard. — Nothing can be more fatal 
to purity of life in either sex than the idea that a 
young man may sow “ wild oats,” and still be a “ first- 
rate good fellow,” and worthy of positions of trust and 
responsibility in society; and the fact that such a no¬ 
tion prevails, is further evidence of the lowered moral 
tone of society to which we have already referred. It 
will be a happy day to the cause of morality when soci¬ 
ety says to the young man who lapses from virtue, as it 
does to the young woman under the same circumstances, 
“ You have forfeited your right to honor and respect. 
You have violated one of the plainest laws of God and 
man. You have become a social leper, and are likely to 
spread vile moral contagion more potent for evil than 
the venom of a rattlesnake, or the contagious virus of 
small-pox or cholera. Hence, unless you repent and re¬ 
form, and earn a right to the. confidence of the good and 
pure, you must be an outcast from society, subjected to 
a social quarantine which will effectively prevent the 
contamination of your fellows.” 

Let young women demand of young men who wish 
to become their husbands, the same unblemished purity 
which is required of them, and we may hope for an im¬ 
provement, at least, in the manners and morals of the 
youth of the rising generation. 

Increase of Vice.—All observing persons whose op¬ 
portunities have been favorable for a study of this sub¬ 
ject, have become convinced of a decided and alarming 
increase in the prevalence of vice. Undoubtedly this is 
due, in part at least, to the general lowering of moral 


Increase of Vice. 


27 


tone among the people, and particularly among the mem¬ 
bers of the rising generation. It must be evident to 
every observing man or woman that conscientiousness, 
love of truth, righteousness, spirituality, and in short, 
all religious principles, have a less active influence upon 
the lives of the youth of the present day than upon 
those of their predecessors. The growing prevalence of 
skepticism, propagated by profane scoffers of the Inger- 
soll type, and encouraged by a certain class of scientists 
who array their notions respecting the teachings of na¬ 
ture against the Bible and religion, have a marked ten¬ 
dency to weaken the general religious faith of the people, 
and lessen the influence of moral precepts upon human 
conduct. 

The familiarity with vice in its grossest forms, which 
arises from the freedom with which the newspapers of 
the day deal with crimes of this sort, with little or no 
attempt at delicacy of expression, and usually dwelling 
with unnecessary particularity upon the details of crime, 
has a decided tendency in this direction. 

The Conseauences of Vice.— Only an educated and 
experienced physician can appreciate in any adequate 
degree the horrible consequences to body as well as 
mind and soul which follow in the wake of social im¬ 
morality. Upon this vice are founded the more than 
twenty thousand brothels which exist in this land of 
Christian civilization and enlightenment. In these ante¬ 
rooms of hell are to be found more than one hundred 
thousand depraved and abandoned women, who have 
offered up their souls and bodies upon the shrine of lust. 
They have abandoned home, kindred, friends,—all that 
is most sweet and dear in life, all that is pure and noble 
and good, all that is human and tender and true, and 


28 


Social Purity. 


have offered themselves upon the altar of vice, human 
chattels to minister to man’s beastliness, to gratify un¬ 
hallowed impulses which “ war against the soul • ” which 
sap the life blood of all human feelings and sentiments; 
which, unrestrained and ungoverned, would speedily 
convert the whole earth into one vast Sodom and Go¬ 
morrah ; which brook no restraint, and are as merciless 
and insatiable as the Minotaur of ancient fable. 

One hundred thousand poor, wretched women thus 
become outcasts from society, despised by their sex, 
looked upon as more debased than the swine that wal¬ 
lows in the mire, or the loathsome reptile that haunts 
the slimy pool, abandoning all hope of this world or the 
next, consigning their souls to eternal infamy, and con¬ 
demning their bodies to a life of shame and misery and 
a death too horrible to contemplate! 

Many young men imagine that they can sow a few 
wild oats,—in other words, can lead for a few months 
or years a life of immorality,—and then reform, “ turn 
over a new leaf,” as they say, and settle down to a so¬ 
ber, steady, and virtuous life. Young man, do not be 
deceived by such sophistry. While it is possible for a 
few to seem to accomplish this, if any man could have 
marshaled before him the great hosts of those who have 
undertaken to act upon this plan, and failed, he would 
be dismayed with fear at the thought of such an under¬ 
taking. A man who has once allowed himself to be¬ 
come entangled in the toils of sensuality, will find 
escape a task by no means easy. A thousand influ¬ 
ences deter him from the reformation which he contem¬ 
plated ; a thousand obstacles appear in the way, none of 
which have previously entered into his calculations; 
and if he is so fortunate as to break away from the 


Consequences of Vice. 


29 


bonds of evil associations, and shake himself free from 
the shackles of sensual habits long fostered, his difficul¬ 
ties are by no means mastered. Although he may set¬ 
tle down to a sober life, the old passions, the old 
customs, the old pleasures, haunt him. What would 
not such a man give to blot out from his memory the 
vices which have been indelibly fixed upon it ? What 
would he not give to rid himself of the filthy imagery 
with which his wanderings from the path of virtue have 
filled his brain ? 

Another thought for the candid consideration of 
young men who imagine that they can sow a few wild 
oats, and be as good as anybody: To a man who 
has allowed the beast of vice to grow up within his 
heart and rule him, who has plunged headlong into 
the sea of sensuous indulgence, to such an one, com¬ 
mon pleasures, the legitimate joys of life, are un¬ 
speakably tame and insipid. Fill your mouth with 
honey; now taste an orange or a luscious pear. Before 
the honey you would have called it sweet, delicious; 
now you say the fruit is insipid, mawkish. So it is 
with our mental and moral tastes. The man who has 
spent the best years of his life in sensual pleasures, can¬ 
not appreciate the quiet, unexciting joys of pure love 
and domestic life. The field of his heart, once covered 
with golden grain, has been burned over by the fires of 
sin, which have left it blackened and seared and scarred 
and blistered, and as incapable of tender sensibilities 
and pure sentiments and emotions, as a charred stump. 
The harvest is past. 

The Cure.—The one radical cure for sensuality in 
every form is pure and undefiled religion. A genuine 
morality is broad enough to take in the whole man, and 


30 


Social Purity. 


demand self-respect, and obedience to all the laws relat¬ 
ing to his welfare. The religion of Socrates, while em¬ 
bodying many and most excellent moral precepts, still 
gave license for the free gratification of the animal in¬ 
stincts, and ignored to a large degree the moral obliga¬ 
tion to care for and discipline the body. The religion of 
Buddha, while stimulating its disciples to a high degree 
of self-control and self-abnegation, ignored the poor body 
as worthy but to be crucified or tormented, as a possible 
means of improving the soul. The religion of Moham¬ 
med, while imposing many sanitary obligations, pictures- 
a heaven teeming with sensual pleasures. Nowhere 
else but in enlightened Christianity is there to be found 
a religion broad enough to embrace a whole human be¬ 
ing, an entire humanity. 

Religion includes something more than simply mo¬ 
rality. It includes not only belief in a higher Power, 
and in personal and individual obligations to the same, 
but a recognition of an individual dependence upon the 
higher Intelligence, and faith in his ability and read¬ 
iness to afford aid and succor in times- of need and dis¬ 
tress. One of the most unhappy tendencies of the 
times is the growing disposition to skepticism, which is 
apparent to every one. Too often the young, dazzled 
by the achievements of science, and perplexed by the 
apparent discrepancies between natural and revealed 
truth, are lead to reject the simple revelation of inspi¬ 
ration, and to exalt beyond their real importance the 
dicta of men of science. Others are beguiled by the wily 
but blasphemous sophistries of Ingersoll and his follow¬ 
ers. A few months since, at a public meeting in Lon¬ 
don, at which our late minister to England, Mr. Lowell, 
was present, some of the speakers of the evening took 


The Cure. 


31 


occasion to sneer at religion, saying that they could get 
along without it, and depreciated its influence upon 
men. The admirable reply of Mr. Lowell was so ef¬ 
fectual an answer to the arguments urged by these 
skeptics, that every young man and woman ought to 
hear it:— 

“ I do not think it safe. I am formulating no creed 
of my own; I have always been a liberal thinker, and 
have therefore allowed others, who differed from me, to 
think also as they liked; but at the same time I fear 
that when we indulge ourselves in the amusement of 
going without a religion, we are not, perhaps, aware 
how much we are sustained at present by an enormous 
mass all about us, of religious feeling and religious con¬ 
viction; so that, whatever it may he safe for us to 
think,—for us who have had great advantages, and 
have been brought up in such a way that a certain 
moral direction has been given to our character,—I do 
not know what would become of the less favored classes 
of mankind if they undertook to play the same game. 
Whatever defects and imperfections may attach to a 
few points of the doctrinal system of Calvin,—the bulk 
of which was simply what all Christians believe,—it 
will be found that Calvanism, or any other ism which 
claims an open Bible and proclaims a crucified and risen 
Christ, is infinitely preferable to any form of polite 
and polished skepticism, which gathers as its votaries 
the degenerate sons of heroic ancestors, who, having 
been trained in a society, and educated in schools, the 
foundations of which were laid by men of faith and pi¬ 
ety, now turn and kick down the ladder by which they 
have climbed up, and persuade men to live without God, 
and leave them to die without hope. 


32 


Social Purity. 


“ The worst kind of religion is no religion at all; and 
these men, living in ease and luxury, indulging them¬ 
selves in the ‘ amusement of going without religion,’ may 
be thankful that they live in lands where the gospel 
they neglect has tamed the beastliness and ferocity of 
the men, who, but for Christianity, might long ago have 
eaten their carcasses like the South Sea Islanders, or cut 
off their heads and tanned their hides like the monsters 
of the French Revolution. 

“ When the microscopic search of skepticism, which 
has hunted the heavens and sounded the seas to disprove 
the existence of a creator, has turned its attention to hu¬ 
man society, and has found on this planet a place ten 
miles square where a decent man can live in decency, 
comfort, and security, supporting and educating his chil¬ 
dren unspoiled and unpolluted; a place where age is 
reverenced, infancy protected, manhood respected, wo¬ 
manhood honored, and human life held in due regard,— 
when skeptics can find such a place ten miles square on 
this globe, where the gospel of Christ has not gone and 
cleared the way, and laid the foundations, and made de¬ 
cency and security possible, it will then be in order for 
the skeptical literati to move thither, and there ventilate 
their views. But so long as these very men are depend¬ 
ent upon the religion which they discard, for every priv¬ 
ilege they enjoy, they may well hesitate a little before 
they seek to rob the Christian of his hope and humanity 
of its faith in that Saviour who alone has given to man 
that hope of eternal life which makes life tolerable and 
society possible, and robs death of its terrors and the 
grave of its gloom.” 

Skepticism not Safe.—Mr. Lowell well remarked, 
“ I do not think it safe,” referring to the position held by 


Skepticism not Safe. 33 

the skeptics to whom he was replying. Is skepticism 
safe for any one ? Is it safe for a young man starting 
out to fight the battles of life ? Can he afford to get 
along without the aid of a religion which can do him no 
possible harm, and which has evidently been a prop and 
a stay to thousands, and a source of comfort of inesti¬ 
mable value ? Think for a moment, young man, what will 
be your condition if in the end it should prove that your 
unbelief was a delusion, and that in rejecting the claims 
of Christianity and religion, you have rejected the only 
means by which you can be rescued from the thralldom 
of sin, and secure participation in a life beyond the 
grave. Suppose, on the other hand, it should prove 
that the Christian is mistaken. What harm can come 
to him ? His religion has been all his life a comfort to 
him, and he has lived a better life, a purer life, and really 
a more successful life than he could have lived without 
it. If there is no life beyond the grave, he has lost noth¬ 
ing by his belief in it. The risk is all on one side. 

Neglecting all considerations but those pertaining to 
the present life, is it not evident that every young man 
or woman who would make a true success of life, needs 
first of all the guiding, strengthening, subduing, and con¬ 
trolling influence of religion? Man is a curious com¬ 
pound. He has in him qualities which ally him to the 
divine and pure beings of another world, linked with 
gross animal qualities which he shares in common with 
the brutes about him. In other words, every man has 
within him a beast, with appetites and passions which 
clamor for gratification. A good part of the battle of 
life, with a man who fights truly and manfully, is to 
subdue the beast within him which, when once it rises 
to the mastery, seizes upon the intelligence, smothers 

3 


34 


Social Purity. 


the moral faculties, and makes of the man, once an im¬ 
age of his divine Creator, a veritable fiend, more grossly 
brutish than the most savage beast that prowls the earth. 
With a nature full of inherited tendencies to vice and 
grossness, surrounded by temptations and incitements 
to evil on every hand, how can a man, even though his 
impulses may he good, contend single-handed against 
such fearful odds ? Religion affords a means by which 
the beasts of appetite and passion may be subdued and 
chained—yea, even slain; and most unwise is he who, 
in his vain self-sufficiency, rejects this most essential of 
all aids, religion. 

The man who injures his constitution by reckless 
disregard of health laws, not only impairs his own use¬ 
fulness and real happiness, shortening his life, and bring¬ 
ing upon himself disease in various forms, with all its 
attendant sufferings and inconveniences, but entails upon 
his children and his children’s children, as well as all 
succeeding generations, the same diseases or tendencies 
thereto, and the same curtailment of life and happiness 
which he himself suffers. Indeed, the results of his fol¬ 
lies may be felt even more keenly by his children and 
grandchildren than by himself. That quaint philoso¬ 
pher, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, remarks that each 
one of us is an omnibus, in which ride all our ancestors. 
What right has any man by reckless habits of life to 
compel each of his children to carry about in his “ om¬ 
nibus ” the results of the selfish gratification of depraved 
tastes and morbid appetites ? 

It may be said, and there is no exaggeration in the 
figure, that each man is a picture gallery, in which hangs 
the portrait of each of his predecessors; and among the 
pictures which hang upon the walls, may be seen some 


Skepticism not Safe. 


35 


brilliant with beauty, others hideous with deformity; 
some beaming with health and vigor, others scarred and 
wasted by disease. Let every man who thinks he has 
a right to treat his body as he pleases, consider for a 
moment the fact that his portrait may sometime hang 
in somebody’s picture gallery, drawn true to nature by 
an artist who never glosses over defects, or embellishes 
deficiencies. It is a matter of no small consequence to 
the owner of the gallery whether the picture which hangs 
there represents vice, disease, and decrepitude, or purity 
and vigorous vitality. 

The growing proportions of the evils of which I 
speak, has stirred the hearts of philanthropic Christian 
people to an effort to stay the tide of evil, and to rescue 
at least a few brands from the burning. 

Some years ago, through the individual efforts of a 
few noble women, there was organized in England a 
society known as the White Cross Army. The head of 
this organization in England is the Bishop of Durham, 
the Rt. Rev. J. B. Lightfoot, D. D., well known through 
his excellent commentaries on the New Testament. The 
Y. M. C. A. of New York has recently undertaken to 
effect an organization of the same sort in this country. 
The object of the Association is thus stated in its consti¬ 
tution: “The object of this Army shall be the promo¬ 
tion of purity among young men, the elevation of public 
opinion regarding the question of personal purity, and 
the maintenance of the same standard for men and 
women.” 

Recently that noblest of humanitarian organizations, 
the National Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, has 
taken up this work by the organization of a Social Purity 
Department. Every pure-minded man and woman in 




36 


Social Purity. 


\ 

the land ought to enlist in this effort to save the young 
of the rising generation, to protect the weak, and to rescue 
the erring. The object of this address is to call your at¬ 
tention to this work, and to interest you in it. I have 
here two pledges, one for men and one for women, which 
I will read :— 


iiciwiMiiaiMiMiwiieiHaiwiMiiaiwiwiwiitiwiwHatwuviwuoiwiiaiwiHiiwii^iwiwiMiioiwiwiwiieiieiiaiMiieiMiwiwiia 


“ THOU GOD SEEST ME.” 

PUB1TYPLIBGE 

FOR. 3MCE3TS5T- 

/ hereby solemnly promise by the help of 
God — 

I. To obey the law of purity in 
thought and act. 

II. To refrain from and to dis¬ 
countenance in others, vulgarity of 
speech, and indecent jests and al¬ 
lusions. 

III. To avoid all books, amuse¬ 
ments, and. associations calculated 
to excite impure thoughts. 

IV. To uphold the same standard 
of purity for men and women. 

V. To oppose all laws and cus¬ 
toms which tend to the degrada¬ 
tion of women, and to labor for their 
reform. 

VI. To endeavor to spread the 
knowledge of these principles, and 
to aid others in obeying them. 

Name , . 

Bate ,... 

“BLESSED ARE THE PURE IN HEART.” 


“THOU GOD SEEST ME.” 



FOR WOMEN. 

/ hereby solemnly promise by the help of 
God— 

I. To obey the law of purity in 
thought and act. 

II. To refrain from and to dis¬ 
countenance in others, all conver¬ 
sation upon impure subjects, and to 
avoid all books, amusements, and 
associations which tend in the di¬ 
rection of impurity. 

III. To be modest in language, 
behavior, and dress. 

IV. To uphold the same standard 
of purity for men and women. 

V. To oppose all laws and cus¬ 
toms which tend to the degradation 
of women, and to labor for their re¬ 
form. 

VI. To endeavor to spread the 
knowledge of these principles, and 
to aid others in obeying them. 

Name ,.. 

Date .. 


“ BLESSED ARE THE PURE IN HEART. ” 

e 






The Purity Movement. 


37 


The objects sought are not wholly the inculcation of 
the principles of purity among the young, but the edu¬ 
cation of public opinion to the point of establishing an 
equal standard for men and women. If a woman strays 
away from the path of rectitude, she is fallen, outcast, 
trodden under foot by society, most of all despised by 
her own sex. Even if she would reform, she can hardly 
find the opportunity to do so. Respectable women will 
not notice her or employ her. 

If a young man is known to be given to lewdness, is 
he debarred from respectable society ? Is he not admit¬ 
ted to the best social circles ? Do not those very re¬ 
spectable persons who would spurn from their presence 
his associate in wrong doing, say of him, Oh, he may be 
a little fast, but he is really a very good fellow after all; 
he is “ sowing his wild oats” now" by and by he will 
settle down and make a very respectable man ? 

This movement asks that men and women be treated 
alike in this matter. God judges them by the same 
law, why not man ? If the sin of the woman makes her 
a social outcast, let the man who sins in the same way 
be made a social outcast also. Justice cries out for re¬ 
form in the usages of society in this matter. 

Another object held in view by this effort is the pro¬ 
tection of young girls from the wiles of evil-minded men. 
Only recently we have seen the English people rising up 
en masse , agitated almost to the point of revolution, de¬ 
manding of Parliament the passage of a law raising the 
age of consent from thirteen to sixteen years. What 
are you prepared to say when I tell you that in some of 
the States of our own enlightened Christian land, the 
age of consent is fixed by law at the infantile period of 
ten years ? And in our own State, the law fixes the age 


38 


Social Purity. 


at which a girl may voluntarily surrender herself to 
shame, at twelve years. 

In the interests of purity, in behalf of humanity, for 
the protection of childish innocence, we demand a change 
of laws which seem to have been framed in the interest 
of evil men and seducers. Let the invader of girlish 
purity be branded by the law as a criminal, and then let 
us see that the laws are rigorously executed. Consider, 
parents, for one moment this fact: If a man steals a 
sheep from your flock, you may have him arrested and 
sent to prison for his crime. That the sheep made no 
resistance against being stolen, will be no defense. If 
he steals your little daughter’s good name and blackens 
her character for life, you may have no redress. Does 
not this thought stir to the very depths your parental 
hearts ? and do you not feel rising within you a storm 
of indignation that the ignorant, the feeble, the unwary, 
the innocent, the flowers of our households, should be 
left thus unprotected, while the lecherous, vice-hardened, 
but wily and smooth-tongued deceiver is provided with 
an easy way of escape from punishment ? The brain 
almost reels under a sense of the overwhelming injus¬ 
tice of such laws. The time has fully come to demand 
a reform. Let us protect the weak, the innocent. Let 
us punish the vile, the really guilty. 

Now, my friends, I have little more to say. I have 
only opened up this subject. There are volumes more 
to be said, but the time is spent. What will you do 
about this matter ? As I have been looking into your 
faces here to-night, I have seen some which said, Ah! 
don’t tell us these awful things. We don’t want to hear 
it. And some of you have been whispering, Too 
dreadful to listen to! how indelicate ! how vulgar! 


Conclusion. 


39 


Such things ought not to be talked about! But I 
have not heard your criticisms nor your protests. Your 
voices have been drowned in my ears by a long, loud, 
despairing wail. List! don’t you hear it in the air,— 
an agonizing cry of hopeless woe, coming up from the 
wretched hosts of the fallen that wander in the depths 
of a living hell, consumed by horrible disease, dying an 
eternal death ? Can we remain silent, can we sit idly 
by and make no effort to stay the progress of this tidal 
wave of vice w T hich already touches our very thresholds, 
and threatens to destroy the last vestiges of purity from 
off the earth ? 

In conclusion, my friends, young and old, I appeal 
to you in the name of childish innocence and maiden 
purity, in the name of the peace and sanctity of the 
domestic hearth, in the name of a sacred Christian re¬ 
ligion which affords us this opportunity, let us this night 
join hands in the crusade against these hidden foes of all 
that is true, and tender, and sweet, and good, and pure; 
let us engage in the earnest conflict against i npurity,— 
a conflict which to-day is supported by the prayers of 
thousands of saintly mothers, and which will, in the 
eternal future toward which we are all hastening, receive 
the benediction of the good and pure of all the ages. 




g^ecfc^e^i^. 


Siro' T ^r- 


THE snow, the beautiful snow, 

Filling the sky and the earth below ! 

Over the house-tops, over the street, 

Over the heads of the people you meet, 
Dancing, 

Flirting, 

Skimming along,— 

Beautiful snow ! it can do nothing wrong, 

Flying to kiss a fair lady’s cheek, 

Clinging to lips in a frolicsome freak. 

Beautiful snow, from the heavens above, 

Pure as an angel, and fickle as love ! 

Once I was pure as the snow; but I fell,— 

Fell, like the snowflakes, from heaven to hell; 

Fell, to be tramped as the filth of the street ; 

Fell, to be scoffed, to be spit on, and beat. 

Pleading, 

Cursing, 

Dreading to die, 

Selling my soul to whoever would buy, 

Dealing in shame for a morsel of bread, 

Hating the living and fearing the dead. 

Merciful God! have I fallen so low ? 

And yet I was once like this beautiful snow ! 
****** 

How strange it would be that this beautiful snow 
Should fall on a sinner with nowhere to go ! 

How strange it would be, when the night comes again 
If the snow and the ice struck my desperate brain ! 
Fainting, 

Freezing, 

Dying alone, 

Too wicked for prayer, too weak for a moan 
To be heard in the crash of the crazy town, 

Gone mad in its joy at the snow’s coming down ; 

To lie and to d e in my terrible woe, 

With a bed md a shroud of the beautiful snow. 

—James W. Watson, 


















o 


CONGRESS 





WORKS ON SOCIAL PURITY. 


The publishers of this pamphlet 


also publish several volumes cover¬ 


ing the whole ground of the ques¬ 
tion of Social Purity, and numerous 
works upon allied subjects, and are 
prepared to furnish a full line of 
Social Purity tracts and pledges, and 
all other literature pertaining to this 
subject. For circulars address, 
HEALTH PUBLISHING CO., 

Battle Creek, Mich. 





















